Awesome, not awesome.
#Awesome
“A radical collaboration between a biologist and an engineer is supercharging efforts to protect grape crops. The technology they’ve developed, using robotics and AI to identify grape plants infected with a devastating fungus, will soon be available to researchers nationwide working on a wide array of plant and animal research.
Plant diseases like powdery mildew can show up in infrared before they are visible to the naked eye; if the researchers can develop tools to help farmers detect disease early, it would enable farmers to target fungicide sprays before infection spreads, meaning less fungicide and fewer lost crops. They’re also working to integrate AI more effectively with scientists in data analysis.” — Krisy Gashler, Writer Learn More from Cornell Chronicle >
#Not Awesome
“A researcher at Switzerland’s EPFL technical university won a $3,500 prize for determining that a key Twitter algorithm favors faces that look slim and young and with skin that is lighter-colored or with warmer tones. Twitter announced on Sunday it awarded the prize to Bogdan Kulynych, a graduate student examining privacy, security, AI and society.
Earlier this year, Twitter itself confirmed its AI system showed bias when its cropping algorithm favored images of white people over Black people. But Kulynych found other problems in how the algorithm cropped photos to emphasize what it deemed most important.” — Stephen Shankland, Reporter Learn More from CNET >
What we’re reading.
1/ The New York City Police Department secretly bought a range of surveillance tools without any public oversight or knowledge. Learn More from WIRED >
2/ Companies in China are creating “Virtual Idols”, or AI social media influencers, which are quickly gaining followers and popularity. Brands are favoring them as they are predictable and don’t come with the risk of scandals that human celebrities do. Learn More from Insider >
3/ Many Americans are completely unaware that they are being tracked by facial recognition in their favorite stores as more and more retailers adopt the technology. Learn More from TechRadar >
4/ OpenAI, the company behind GPT-3, has developed a new machine learning tool that can translate the English language into code. Learn More from The Verge >
5/ Machine learning helped the Australian swimming team reach record-breaking levels at the Tokyo Olympics. Swimming Australia first teamed up with Amazon Web Services in 2019 to begin taking their competition to the next level. Learn More from The Sydney Morning Herald >
6/ Samsung is using AI to help with the design of their complex computer chips. Learn More from WIRED >
7/ Researchers have developed “Master Faces” that can bypass current facial recognition systems. Their findings further highlight the bias and potential issues with the technology. Learn More from VICE >
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Are AI influencers the new Kardashians? was originally published in Machine Learnings on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
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